ABC News anchor Diane Sawyer’s interview with Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and her husband former astronaut Mark Kelly was easily the top broadcast program at 10 PM according to Nielsen fast national ratings. The “20/20” special drew a 9.0 rating/10 share household rating and a 3.9 rating/9 share in the adults 25-54 demo. All told the “20/20” special drew around 13.3 million total viewers.
Bolstered by an exclusive interview of its own, NBC’s “Rock Center” had what appeared to be its best-showing yet with a 3 rating/5 share household rating and a 1.6/4 in the demo. The program drew just shy of 4.5 million viewers–up 30% from last week–though final numbers can shift from the preliminaries. Not surprisingly, the first half-hour was the strongest for the NBC program.
ABC had the benefit of focusing the entire hour on Giffords, and had weeks to promote the special. NBC had just two hours to alert potential viewers to the Bob Costas interview of Jerry Sandusky.
> Update: TVbytheNumbers has adjusted, final ratings, with downward shifts for the two news programs, due, in part, to local broadcasts of ESPN’s Monday Night Football game.